


Am I Coming Through Right?

by Leviusify



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Auditory Processing Disorder, Byleth has trouble hearing, F/M, Hearing Disorder, Mental Disorder, Noise Sensitive, Noise Sensitivity, Severe Auditory Processing Disorder, he tries his best
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-05
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-18 07:53:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29854932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leviusify/pseuds/Leviusify
Summary: At a young age, Byleth develops a hearing disorder which jumbles people's words around. He quickly finds that he admires the battlefield more than any situation, but when he's offered a prestigious teaching stint at Garreg Mach, how will he overcome his disability?
Relationships: My Unit | Byleth/Shamir Nevrand
Kudos: 5





	Am I Coming Through Right?

**Author's Note:**

> PLEASE READ THIS!  
> Auditory Processing Disorder doesn't make you say random incorrect words in a sentence like an idiot. Byleth is saying all the sentences he wants to say correctly, but he hears himself incorrectly. Everyone in the story can get what he's saying except him. Auditory Processing Disorder is complex in the ways it reveals itself, and the best way to represent that in a written context is my having words slotted in with other words. I obviously do not mean to degrade or disrespect anybody with APD.

Byleth didn’t really know when all his hearing problems started. He did remember not having it when he was very young, he thought. It might have been somewhere around his seventh summer with Jeralt’s mercenary company, though. That was when people turned from talking to each other normally to spurting out incomprehensible gibberish. Byleth remembered when it all started, he thought it was a big joke by the mercenaries and he played along with it, going around camp making silly noises with people and funny faces. Byleth only got worried when Jeralt (who Byleth knew as definitely NOT a joker) came up to him, kneeled down on one knee, put his hand on his shoulder, looked Byleth in the eye and said

“Byleth, hut’s gong wrong with you, kid?”

Byleth’s face darkened as he realized maybe everyone wasn’t joking. Maybe the local nobles Jeralt was always taking jobs from had made a new rule that everyone had to learn a different language. Byleth started to talk, but it was confusing hearing his own voice. He tried to say “I don’t know, what’s happening?” and when the words came from his mouth, the sounds came back to his ears differently. Byleth paused and talked again. He focused really hard on what was in his head. He was going to say “People are talking wrong to me, Jeralt.” He concentrated hard on his sentence, squinting his eyes in focus, and spoke. But the words that came out of his mouth came out wrong to him. The sounds came out of his mouth and looped back to his ears, and Byleth heard himself say “People are walking weird to me, Jeralt.” Byleth stuttered and tried again. “People are caulking wrong for me, Jeralt!” Byleth clasped his hands over his ears and panicked. “Jeralt!” He yelled. One word couldn’t go wrong. “Jeralt! Jeralt!” He sat down on the ground, and this time he would say one word at a time and make a full sentence. “Jeralt. People… Are talking… wrong.” That worked. That was good. Byleth would need to go slow until he got better. Jeralt, confused, spoke back. “Kid, what do you meet people are talking wrong?” He could almost fully understand that one. He basically got it. He tried to pull out another slow sentence. “I say… Words… Don’t come… Back right.” Byleth was getting a hang of it, he had managed to speed up his last sentence a bit more. He tried to talk normally. “I tried to sell wires and they don’t come back right. Jeralt, I can’t hire right! My hearing is wrong!” Byleth was on the ground fully now, he looked at his hand and slapped it to his left ear again and again. 

He tried once more. This time he would talk fast. See if he can fool it. But at the fast rate he talked, he couldn’t even make out any words he said. It had just formed into a pile of noodles for him. He tried to sift through what came out of his mouth. When he tried to talk fast again, he couldn’t understand himself. Jeralt seemed to be nodding, like he understood what Byleth was trying to say. Byleth had been trying to say “Jeralt, my hearing’s gone wrong and I can’t understand anything I’m saying, I’m sick, help!” Jeralt looked like he understood perfectly what Byleth had just said, but to Byleth it was like trying to scoop up a stream of running water with his bare hands. Every time he went in and got some and came back up, it would just flow out of his hands like it would his ears. He kept scooping and scooping the word water, but he seemed to be coming up with nothing every time. Byleth ran around in small circles shaking his head around back and forth to try to get the gunk out of his ears, to try to let fresh air flow into his head so he could hear right. He dropped to the ground and rolled around to let his bad hearing flow out onto the ground, and be left behind as a puddle of bad water, but nothing happened. Byleth screamed out “JERALT! I CANT HELP RIGHT!” Wrong again. Focus. Tell him. “JERALT! MY HEARING IS GOOD!” Gone! It was anything but good! Byleth ran into his and Jeralt’s tent, slamming his head against the ground to try and shake the worms out of his head. He spoke repetitively, trying to hear himself. “Help. Help. Hire. Help. Help. Hold. Help. Help. Home. Help. Help.” Byleth thought fast and scrambled to Jeralt’s side of the tent, and pulled his medicine bag out from his sleeproll. He opened it up and was bombarded with the smell of fresh herbs, before he searched through the bag pulling out the tool he needed: A large tweezer like tool meant for removing stuck in arrowheads. He had seen Jeralt use it before, it looked easy to do. He pressed the tweezers together a few times before starting to insert it into his left ear. He tried to fit the large apparatus into his earlobe, to remove the blockage. Jeralt entered the tent, and seeing Byleth, ran over and took the tool from his hands. Byleth laid his head on Jeralt’s and started to talk again. “Ears. Ears. Ears. Hear. Hear. Ears. Eyes. Ears. Ears. Elk.” Byleth clapped his hands to his ears once more before laying down in his own bedroll. Jeralt spoke to him reassuringly, and very slowly. “Don’t worry kid. We’ll find an apothecary.”

Byleth had gone to visit the apothecary the very next day, he remembered. He checked Byleth for ear infections, asked if he’d acted strange before this, to which Jeralt said was very rude, and said lots of phrases to Byleth asking him to repeat them. When he repeated what he said, both the apothecary and Jeralt looked very displeased, and he supposed he messed up somehow. The apothecary had talked to Jeralt in private, and when Byleth listened in, he couldn’t make much of it. The apothecary said “His nervous sister is disabled.” 

Byleth never got the chance to ask about his poor sister.

Battle suited Byleth just fine. While he never managed to navigate social situations that well (everyone just spoke way too fast for him to keep up) battle was where he truly shined. The clashing of swords and sounds of steel cutting into flesh created a cacophony of sounds that he could truly follow. Fighting wasn’t about talking to people, it was about technique and practice. If you have good technique and practice lots, you’re unbeatable. Most common thugs they faced didn’t even know how to read a treatise on swordplay, and it was needless to say that Byleth was leagues ahead having learned from a famous warrior like Jeralt. Byleth easily beat the bandit in front of him’s axe out of his hands, and before the bandit could react he used the momentum from the sword’s disarming flick to quickly shift forward and impale the bandit on his blade. He quickly turned around, making sure to step to the side and lean into his turn. He knew that he was in the thick of things, and a bandit was likely to his left, so he drew his blade from the bottom, sweeping it up as he turned around. With this flourish, he managed to catch the bandit right in the stomach before sweeping upwards. He managed to get all the way up to their neck before retrieving his blood covered blade. Looking to his left, he charged with his shoulder into the bandit advancing towards him. He had enough strength to knock him down easily, and quickly plunged his sword into his neck before turning his attention back to the front, where more bandits were regrouping to charge him. He put his blade into a blocking position, ready to quickly parry. Life was good when Byleth was in combat. He didn’t much mind who he was killing. Jeralt was the type of captain that still maintained some morals. The main enemies they fought were petty bandits, roaming monsters, or rogue houses. Most of them were decidedly evil people, and if you didn’t focus much on it you eventually became desensitized towards the blood and the guts, and instead focused on the dance of blades, the rush of adrenaline died down and was replaced by cold focus. In the end, fighting became very enjoyable for Byleth, and was a place where he could truly shine and make a difference. It helped that most of his opponents were easy pickings, managing to rack up kill after kill with simple footwork. When Byleth fought their leaders it was more entertaining, managing to block and parry before stepping back with a decisive cut that would slay his foe. As he nonchalantly cleared out the bandits, he looked around the battlefield. Everyone else seemed to be doing well, and the battle was essentially over. He sheathed his sword and shakily steadied his breath down to a normal level. Wasn’t there something that differentiated this from the normal fight? Byleth got too caught up in the battle to notice. Wait! The kids! Some random nobles had been… Captured? Ambushed? Were they escorting them? They were fighting alongside them, and Byleth saw they had potential for beginners. Byleth didn’t pay attention to the mission specifics. The kids looked a bit shaken up, but they seemed fine. He could see as he walked over to them that they were obviously all bothered by the blood staining their extravagant outfits. Har. It washed off pretty easily, Byleth found. Still, wearing your court gown to the battlefield was something he could laugh at them about. He walked up to the group of nobles, mostly making sure they were okay. One of them had got a bit of a cut on the shoulder, but they all looked fine. Alright. Byleth smiled at them before walking on to meet Jeralt-

He was suddenly stopped.

The kid in the yellow clothes came up to him and smiled, before talking his ear off. This kid seemed like a motormouth. He could barely understand a thing he was saying, just parts of words. It wasn’t like Byleth was so crippled that he couldn’t hear anything when someone spoke quickly, it was just very very hard. Judging by his body language, he was thanking him, but being a smartass about it. He could tell with these things, mercenary life attracted a lot of smartasses. Typically they ended up dead. This kid probably thought he “fought dirty” in the battle and how that was probably a big deal for him because he was a noble and blah blah blah. Mercenary life was all about fighting dirty, Byleth thought. He never left home for a battle without a small bag of sand within easy reach for throwing into people’s eyes if he needed it. Yellow kid stops talking, and blue kid pipes up. Blue kid’s got a regal leading air. He seems like a good kid. Probably a general in training. Blue kid talks slower than motormouth. He likes blue kid. He manages to pry out that his name is Dimitri. Dimitri talks slow. He’s nice. Dmitri runs a house of lions at a school. Must be interesting. Red kid’s a girl, surprisingly enough. You don’t see a lot of girl mercenaries. There was that famous assassin, but she retired last time he heard about her. Good to see some diversity in the field. If he thought Dimitri talked regal, he clearly hadn’t seen red kid yet. Every word chosen carefully, and best of all, she talks real slowly. All her words have meaning. Red kid’s great. Her name is Edelgard. She runs the Black Eagles. That means Dimitri’s lions were actually a warrior platoon, not lions. Byleth felt a bit stupid, but nobles had a lot of eccentricies sometimes. He felt comfortable enough to say that one day he might even join Edelgard’s eagles. She seemed to like that. He liked Edelgard a lot. He was distracted from his conversation by what seemed to be some drama from over the field. An armored squadron was approaching. Byleth drew his blade, but saw Jeralt talking with them and sheathed it. He ran over.

It happened really fast for Byleth to know it, but he was face to face with the archbishop of Fodlan’s church. Currently he’d been escorted to Garreg Mach monastery with his father. Jeralt told him that he had business to attend to here, but not much else. He sat near the front of a large chapel, where in front of an ornate statue two green haired figures of authority talked with Jeralt. Byleth could kind of tell that they were talking about him, probably because of the way the archbishop and her friend stole glances his way. He was reading a copy of a holy text. He was sure nobody would mind, this book seemed quite popular, all over Fodlan. He had seen it in many noble’s homes, commoners as well. Byleth had taken a liking to reading, since he wasn’t one for social situations typically. Byleth had never read this book before. It was very interesting to say the least. Byleth occasionally looked up at Jeralt and… Rhea. It was Rhea, her name. He liked Rhea. He continued to read pages of the book when he heard Jeralt calling for him. It was easy to hear better when people were loud. Byleth stood up, and put the book down on the chapel bench before walking over to them. Before Byleth could stand by him for comfort, Jeralt began to walk out of the chapel. Byleth turned and watched him leave. Seteth turned to talk to Rhea for a bit, he couldn't hear them. Rhea turned back to him. “Greetings, my child. Your father has told me about you. I am pleased to finally meet you.” In the middle of each sentence, she took a pause so that he could process it, and she talked slower than a normal person would as well. He supposed Jeralt had explained about him, then. Rhea explained to him that they actually had a job opening: A small bit of time teaching a class for the monastery as a professor. Maybe even teaching the houses of those kids. He was a bit nervous at first, but he supposed that Jeralt had already convinced them that he would join, so he said yes. He said he wanted to teach the Black Eagles, but he didn’t put much thought into the decision. It would only be a week-long stint or something, right?

Byleth looked over his lesson plans and gulped. Hopefully everything would go right. They were covering a lot of very basic material. The basics were the most important however, and Byleth knew it all well. He hoped that he could explain everything well, but even if he couldn’t he hoped that his vast repository of knowledge would make up for his lack of charisma. What if the students started talking too fast? What if he heard one of their questions wrong? He couldn’t screw this up. He wanted to make Jeralt proud. A week of teaching and back to the battlefield, back to normalcy. He could deal with that. The students began filing in, and took their seats, giving him greetings as they did. He waved hello back, and cleared his throat. There were a lot of students. They all looked at him very intensely. They were all expectant of him to start talking. He cleared his throat again and started fidgeting with his hands. He scanned the room. Edelgard looked at him and smiled. It was… Reassuring, to say the least. He took a deep breath and began to teach. He rapped on the board, where he had hung up some pictures ripped out from their textbook of basic weapons. He spoke slowly, so he could hear himself well and make sure he wasn’t screwing up. 

It was… 10 minutes in by now. Nobody had asked any questions yet. Judging by his students' reactions, he hadn’t screwed up by much. They were talking about basic sword to sword combat. Understandably so, it was the easiest form of opposition for a beginner to understand, and from there they could build off to disarming strikes and parries. He was flipping through the textbook to the page he saw before class (where was it? It had a great diagram…) when a voice startled him. “Professor?”

He looked up and searched the room. He noticed that the hat girl had her hand up. Didn’t she have some whole thing going on with her? He searched his mind and his attendance records. Did Edelgard talk about her? Dorothea! Yes, that was it. Her name was Dorothea and… She wasn’t a noble. Okay. Do this right.

“Can I help you, Dorothea?”

Good. You’re doing fine. Think really hard. Process what she’s saying.

“Professor, what’s the impact of magic in physical close combat?”   
He did it. Got every word. Collected them and fit them together like a puzzle. Amazing.

He answered proudly.

“Magic isn’t a surefire way to block an incoming attack, but if you can manage to scorch them at close range before they can approach you, you can avoid that threat entirely.”

Wow. It was like he was really teaching. Byleth was on a roll! Dorothea smiled and asked one last question.

“Professor, hand long could you’ve bought a mercenary?”

The other students looked at her and blushed, like she’d asked a very personal question. Byleth couldn’t make heads or tails of what she’d just said to him. He smiled and decided to try and have another go at it.

“I’m sorry, can you say that again?”   
Dorothea was the one blushing this time, as if Byleth was playing some cruel game with her by asking her to repeat herself. Edelgard’s eyes widened.

“I said, how long have you been a mercenary?”

Oh. Okay, he got it this time. Sure, he could indulge her.

“I’ve worked as a mercenary for my entire life, under Jeralt. I’ve had more battles than I can count!” He chuckled. Back on with class.

The dark haired kid spoke up. “How many people have you killed?”   
The class was alight with murmurs, cries of “HUBERT!”, shaken heads, and shocked expressions. 

It was a valid question, he guessed. But what he had learned about social situations was that he shouldn’t answer it. The dark haired kid was probably joking. But, when he looked at him, he didn’t seem like much of a joker. But then the sounds started filing in like the students into the classroom. The kids started talking to each other, each one over the other. Each voice stepped over each other like a cacophony of sounds. The blue haired kid began to speak boisterously, proclamations of something about evil and Hubert and he kept talking. He was the loudest kid of the group and the most understandable. He wished he would just shut up. The orange haired one started talking in a chivalrous tone, kept yapping and yapping, eyes directing their attention at Edelgard. The two voices crossed and bended with each other before becoming one large, combined beast. The girls began to pipe up now, one after the other. Dorothea talked in a dramatic, shocked tone of voice that kept rolling on and on like she could never run out of things to say. The purple headed one in the back began to speak in a chorus of nervous ums and ahs, like she would give anything to be far away from this situation. Same here, kid. Pink tattoos spoke in a voice that sounded especially strange, he’s not sure he would be able to understand her if she wasn’t part of this ensemble of noise. Green hair piped up as well, talking in a smooth monotone voice about how everyone should just quiet down, but he wasn’t exactly helping.. Edelgard began to join in with green hair’s chorus of reason, demanding that everybody should be quiet. She looked worried, nervously glancing up at Byleth every now and then. Hubert chuckled darkly and spoke in a tone of voice that sounded gravely and rough, a low rumble that laid an undertone to the infinite cascade of sounds. The beast made from their voices reached into Byleth’s ear, like he had tried to do all those years ago to remove some sort of blockage. Byleth stepped back, trying to get distance between himself and all the noises that were occurring around him, but could do nothing. He clapped a hand over his left ear, trying to block the sounds like a parried blade, but they kept storming in through his right. He plugged both ears with his hands, but the dull muffle of the voices continued to storm through his defences, and his plugged ears only meant the loudest, most piercing voices were focused on even more. He stepped back again, trying to find ground between himself and the sounds but nothing came up. He continued to march backwards until he ran into something, the object tipping over and taking him with it. There was a shuddering crash as he and the blackboard fell to the ground of the classroom, knocking over papers and books, and displacing his desk, before silence. Silence that was brief, before being interrupted by the sound of a bell. Mid class break. Guess he had been teaching for more than 10 minutes. Time flies, right? The class looked over at him with stunned silence, mouth agape, before Edelgard quickly waved all of them out the door, including Hubert. Byleth slowly stood up off the ground, before sitting down at his desk. He put his hands over his ears and his elbows on the desk, looking down and becoming deeply engrossed in the wooden grain. Edelgard walked from the door towards him, approaching him at the front of the desk. Byleth sighed.   
“Bell’s rung. You can go off with your friends, now.”

Edelgard looked down at him.

“I’d be more concerned about you, professor. It is my first day at Garreg Mach, but I didn’t know that the classroom was a battle against you as well.”

She smiled, before quickly turning back to a frown.

“I’m sorry. That humor was in bad taste.”

Byleth looked up at her finally and smiled, taking in her appearance. She looked just about as old as him, really. So strange how they differed, though. They had grown up on paths of life that were extremely different, but they did intersect a bit he supposed. Byleth spoke up. 

“I’m sorry, princess- your highness. I might need a break for a bit. Fix up the board.”

Edelgard stepped a bit closer to the side of the desk.

“Rhea did tell me about you, you know. I am the house leader, after all.” Byleth sighed and looked down at the desk once more.

“Then you know that I’m not exactly fit for teaching, the one job where all you do is listen and talk. I’m sorry, really. I ought to try harder. There should be staff who know more than me.” Edelgard put her hand over his, which was lying on the desk. “You’re fine, Byleth. I might have to tell the class about you, though. You seem very knowledgeable in all regards, and I do want to get to know you better, alright? We’ll make sure to just keep the noise levels down.” Byleth smiled, reassured. Edelgard asked another question.

“Do you want to come with us to lunch today?”

Byleth perked up. “Teachers can do that?”   
Edelgard smiled. “They’re allowed to have tea parties with students, train with them, cook together, and garden. It’s supposed to be a school where you get to bond with each other lots.” Byleth thought about this a bit. He already knew some people he’d like to ask out for tea. “That sounds nice, Edelgard. I think I’d enjoy having lunch with you and the class. Thank you.” Edelgard smiled back and began to leave the classroom. Byleth looked back at the toppled blackboard. This might be rather fun.

The day of teaching had passed better once Edelgard presumably told the class about Byleth. There weren’t a lot of questions anymore, but the ones that were asked were spoken… Incredibly… Slowly. Byleth didn’t have the heart to correct them, to say that he could understand more than that, but at the same time he could now understand them a lot better. Once class ended, Byleth rushed off to the marketplace where he bought a fancy blend of tea. When Byleth arrived at the monastery, he heard chatter about the assassin of legend, and how she had settled down at Garreg Mach, as a knight of Seiros. Shamir Nevrand. Dagdan native turned ferocious mercenary, before settling down as a noble knight. A legendary story, and a mythical fighter, and now he would be asking her out for tea. Byleth walked into the training grounds, where he saw her talking with a fellow knight, Catherine. He had met her at the chapel, though they didn’t talk long. Byleth stilled his beating heart. All the things he could ask her about. Were her stories really true? Byleth cleared his throat, adjusted his tabard, and walked over to the pair. 

Shamir looked at him.

“Ah. The new professor. We were just discussing you, actually.”

Catherine looked at him, smiling.

“How’s life with the Black Eagles treating you.”

Byleth put on his best winning smile and responded.

“Good! They’re great! Great kids.”

He cleared his throat and continued.

“Erm, Shamir, I worked as a mercenary, and… and I’ve heard a lot about you with my company. With Jeralt. Jeralt’s company. We worked with each other. I’m his kid. Um…”

He scratched his head and kept talking. He hadn’t meant to do that. Keep talking.

“You’re a bit of a local legend to us, really. The mythical mercenary. When I heard you were here, I was very excited. I wanted to ask you a lot of questions.”

He held his hands behind his back, like some sort of war general. Stupid, stupid, just finish it off.

“Anyways, to get to the point, I was thinking if maybe I could ask you about your mercenary life? Compare notes? You’re quite the inspiration to me. I, I bought some tea we could talk over, if you want.”

Byleth stopped himself there. That was good, he thought. It could work, maybe. All he had to do was wait for a response. He brought his eyes up from his feet to look at Shamir. She surprisingly didn’t look unimpressed. In fact, she was smiling.

“A local legend huh? My reputation precedes me. But I won’t be able to make it, I have business to attend to. Rumors of some sort of village uprising or what have you. Take care, Byleth.”

Shamir and Catherine turned and walked away.

Byleth stood there, defeated. He most likely wouldn’t have done well either way.

He sighed, and began to walk back to class. Break was ending soon, wasn’t it?

Dorothea and Edelgard sat at a quaint table with a cookie platter and two cups of tea. Their heads were craned looking upwards, watching the whole exchange go down. Dorothea took a sip from her blend.

“They’re perfect for each other, aren’t they?”

Edelgard shrugged and took a sip from hers.

“I hope they can get along well with each other.”

Dorothea scoffed.

“Like you haven’t read about the heroic warrior and their antisocial, stoic sidekick falling in love a thousand times already.”

Edelgard had to chuckle at that.

"I suppose."


End file.
